George McNish/The Star-LedgerMets reliever Aaron Heilman can't watch as Albert Pujols of the Cardinals rounds third base with a two-run home run in the 14th inning at Shea Stadium. St. Louis won, 10-8.

NEW YORK -- The opponents were the St. Louis Cardinals, certainly. That was easy enough to tell from the sight of big, bad Albert Pujols playing first base, Rick Ankiel in center field and 2006 NLCS hero Yadier Molina behind the plate.

But the home team ... was that the New York Mets, or the New Orleans Mets?

The bottom four hitters in the Mets' order last night were: Fernando Tatis, left field; Robinson Cancel, catcher; Argenis Reyes, second base, and Brandon Knight, pitcher. All call-ups from the Triple-A affiliate in New Orleans. The latest is Knight, summoned Friday to start in place of Pedro Martinez, who is in the Dominican Republic mourning the death of his father.

Of course, the Mets are playing so well these days that even with half a lineup from Triple A they figure to still have a fighting chance to beat anybody.

Down by a run entering the ninth, they tied the game on Tatis' home run off Cardinals closer Ryan Franklin, forcing extra innings. But in the 14th, Aaron Heilman (1-4), working his third inning of relief, gave up a two-out, two-run home run to Pujols and the Mets finally went down, 10-8, at 12:19 a.m. this morning.

"We had shots to get it done, we just didn't get it done," said Mets manager Jerry Manuel. "I just have to applaud Aaron (Heilman) for his effort, more than anything else."

With the loss, the Mets dropped a game off their lead in the NL East race to Florida and Philadelphia, both of whom won yesterday. The Mets hold a one-game lead in the division race with the final game of the homestand coming this afternoon before they head to Florida for three games beginning tomorrow.

The Mets lost despite out-homering the Cards, 4-1. Besides Tatis, Jose Reyes and the red-hot Carlos Delgado (two) hit round-trippers for the Mets. But St. Louis had more hits, 21-16, including six singles by leadoff man Skip Schumaker, who was aboard on Pujols' game-winner.

"It's kind of disappointing, because we should win this game," Tatis said. "But this is baseball."

Asked before the game what he hoped to get out of Knight, Mets manager Jerry Manuel didn't ask for too much.

"If he could get us beyond the sixth inning -- with a chance to win the game -- that would be a good place for us to be," he said.

That's almost exactly what Knight did. He only made it through five innings, but overcame a tough start and pitched well enough to exit with a 5-4 lead.

And that was hard to believe, considering the Cardinals sent nine men to the plate and scored four runs in the first. The first five batters reached base safely against Knight and the first out was a sacrifice fly by Molina that made the score 3-0. That was followed by an RBI single by Aaron Miles to make it 4-0 before Knight managed to get out of the inning.

But the Mets immediately got half of those runs back to ease the pressure on Knight. Reyes led off with a double and after Endy Chavez's sacrifice attempt went foul, Chavez tripled to right field to get one run back. David Wright's grounder to short scored Chavez to make it 4-2.

Things were much better for Knight after the jitters went away. With runners on first and second and one out in the second, Delgado booted a grounder by Ankiel, but the first baseman hustled after the carom and got to it in time to field and throw to Knight covering for the second out. Knight then struck out Troy Glaus to end the inning and he followed that with a 1-2-3 third.

The Mets tied the score with a pair of runs in the third.

Delgado blasted a one-out, 90-mph fastball deep to right-center for a solo home run -- his 21st -- and Carlos Beltran followed with an infield single and scored on Tatis' double to left.

Tatis, though, may have short-circuited what could have been a big inning when he ran to third on a bouncer to short by Cancel and was tagged out for the second out of the inning. After a single by Argenis Reyes, Knight grounded out to end the inning.

Jose Reyes' 12th homer of the season in the fourth put Knight in line for a win. But that chance quickly disappeared as the Mets' bullpen surrendered four runs in the sixth.

Carlos Muniz, pitching for the first time in a week, gave up three straight one-out singles that tied the game in the sixth, before Pedro Feliciano struck out the lefty-swinging Ankiel for the second out.

Manuel then brought on right-hander Joe Smith to pitch to Glaus, who dribbled a grounder up the third-base line that scored a run when Wright fielded the ball but had no play for an out. Molina singled home another run and Miles doubled home another to make it 8-5.

"A big play in the game was Troy Glaus' infield hit," Manuel said. "That was the biggest play of the game. (Wright) said he thought the ball hit something and came fair. His initial read was that it was going to go foul, and it hit something."